By: Associated Press
July 22, 2021
With Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos soaring into suborbital space, three U.S. flights to the International Space Station (ISS) in July, and SpaceX delivering 88 satellites to orbit in the last six weeks, space traffic is surging. And this is just the beginning of increased commercial and governmental activity in space.
August will see several more trips to the ISS and more launches of satellites. Additionally, the Biden administration signed an agreement with the European Space Agency to use more satellites to address climate change through earth science research. This increased space traffic serves a wide array of purposes and represents vast investments by the private space industry and government. But these investments are going to increasingly be jeopardized by the massive amount of space junk already circling Earth.
There’s plenty of room to fly up there, but, believe it or not, NASA estimates there are already 23,000 pieces of debris larger than 10 centimeters and over 500,000 pieces of smaller junk in orbit. This space junk, or orbital debris, travels at high speeds and even a small piece can cause serious damage or destruction if it hits a spacecraft or satellite.